Hello from Mindo. Hey, that rhymes. Actually, almost everything in Spanish seems to rhyme with ¨Mindo¨; as one of my inexplicable pet peeves is accidentally saying things that rhyme, it pisses me off that a) Mindo is beautiful b) many people ask me what I think of Mindo and c) the Spanish word for beautiful that comes to my mind first is ¨lindo¨.
It really is quite pretty here, though; Mindo´s located in the cloud forest, a couple hours away from Quito but in all other aspects a completely different world. For one thing, it´s a lot warmer: my friend Andrea was confused last year when someone told her that Mindo was very ¨coat¨(¨abrigo¨), which seems to mean that being here is warm, like wearing a coat. Everything here is slow and laid-back, locals reclining on plastic chairs outside their houses and watching it all pass by.
Alas, there´s not as much going on here as the locals might like, because the one-two punch of swine flu and economic crisis has knocked out a lot of tourism. I had my hostal entirely to myself the first night, which was a little disconcerting as it was way off the main road in the middle of the nowhere. El Descanso is a beautiful, beautiful place, but I switched out the next day. I´m now in a place whose name I can neither spell nor pronounce (Kascafesu?), a fairly new addition to the Mindo scene custom- built for an American ex-Peace Corps volunteer and the man she married in Ecuador. They seem to have a thing for stonework: it´s kind of like living inside a pizza oven. But very comfortable, and folks are quite friendly: I´d recommend it.
It´s been an entertaining couple of days. I went tubing on Friday with a couple Americans. It shattered all my illusions of calmly floating, Huck-Finn style, down a peaceful little meandering stream: basically, you´re riding the rapids on a raft made of inner tubes tied loosely to each other. Highlight of the trip was definitely when one of the tubes simply popped and deflated against a rock; sometimes, it´s best to NOT understand it when one guide says in Spanish that the raft´s a piece of crap. They did assure us, however, that they haven´t lost a tourist yet, so I had that in my favor.
The night brought Mindo´s main event--the Concerta De Ranas (frog concert)! A naturalist opened a hostería/frog sanctuary a little outside of town, and now puts on a little tour and show every night but Monday. I got there a little early and spent a good long while wondering what to expect--were the frogs, in that moment, putting on little tuxedos? Actually tuning the world´s smallest violin? As it turns out, the naturalist pulls a hapless volunteer/translator from the audience, has his lackies pass out tiny cups of wine, and delivers a long speech about the importance of frog conservation, before playing a recording of various frog sounds, to which the actual frogs respond. He then knows where they are, and leads everyone on a walk around the grounds, pointing out all the different animals he can find with his flashlight and recorder.
It was pretty damn cool: cockroaches larger than your hand, bioluminescent bacteria, adult frogs not much bigger than a human fingernail. The forest is an incredible system, and it´s amazing how much life you find if someone tells you where to look.
Today, I visited one of several mariposarios (butterfly gardens), which was equally fabulous. My
favorites are the blue morphos--huge, clumsy things that flop around as if drugged by their own weight. On the outside, they´re a dull brown, with spots to trick predators into thinking they´re owl eyes--when the wings open, though, there´s often a shocking flash of bright blue. It was good fun spending an hour or so watching them.
And then, onwards and upwards to the cascada (waterfall). Was a bit nervous when I discovered that the path to the waterfull started with a tarabita, or cable car: basically, you pay a guy a buck, stick yourself in a cage, and he pushes the cage over a rope across the river, because bridges are for sissies when you hike in Ecuador. Decided to go back the non-terebita way. The cascada, as it turns out, was yet another pay point/adventure destination: just for you, mom, I declined the opportunity to first zipline through the forest, then toboggan into the river. Settled for a nice, easy walk instead: it was quite pleasant.
Got back in time to pick up my laundry: now, all that´s left to do is enjoy a nice dinner (I now know that ¨tilapia¨is an entire, fried fish with eye sockets and tail, so I think it´s all downhill from lunchtime!) and get my last night of non-city sleep: tomorrow, off to Quito and then to Cartagena!
It really is quite pretty here, though; Mindo´s located in the cloud forest, a couple hours away from Quito but in all other aspects a completely different world. For one thing, it´s a lot warmer: my friend Andrea was confused last year when someone told her that Mindo was very ¨coat¨(¨abrigo¨), which seems to mean that being here is warm, like wearing a coat. Everything here is slow and laid-back, locals reclining on plastic chairs outside their houses and watching it all pass by.
Alas, there´s not as much going on here as the locals might like, because the one-two punch of swine flu and economic crisis has knocked out a lot of tourism. I had my hostal entirely to myself the first night, which was a little disconcerting as it was way off the main road in the middle of the nowhere. El Descanso is a beautiful, beautiful place, but I switched out the next day. I´m now in a place whose name I can neither spell nor pronounce (Kascafesu?), a fairly new addition to the Mindo scene custom- built for an American ex-Peace Corps volunteer and the man she married in Ecuador. They seem to have a thing for stonework: it´s kind of like living inside a pizza oven. But very comfortable, and folks are quite friendly: I´d recommend it.
It´s been an entertaining couple of days. I went tubing on Friday with a couple Americans. It shattered all my illusions of calmly floating, Huck-Finn style, down a peaceful little meandering stream: basically, you´re riding the rapids on a raft made of inner tubes tied loosely to each other. Highlight of the trip was definitely when one of the tubes simply popped and deflated against a rock; sometimes, it´s best to NOT understand it when one guide says in Spanish that the raft´s a piece of crap. They did assure us, however, that they haven´t lost a tourist yet, so I had that in my favor.
The night brought Mindo´s main event--the Concerta De Ranas (frog concert)! A naturalist opened a hostería/frog sanctuary a little outside of town, and now puts on a little tour and show every night but Monday. I got there a little early and spent a good long while wondering what to expect--were the frogs, in that moment, putting on little tuxedos? Actually tuning the world´s smallest violin? As it turns out, the naturalist pulls a hapless volunteer/translator from the audience, has his lackies pass out tiny cups of wine, and delivers a long speech about the importance of frog conservation, before playing a recording of various frog sounds, to which the actual frogs respond. He then knows where they are, and leads everyone on a walk around the grounds, pointing out all the different animals he can find with his flashlight and recorder.
It was pretty damn cool: cockroaches larger than your hand, bioluminescent bacteria, adult frogs not much bigger than a human fingernail. The forest is an incredible system, and it´s amazing how much life you find if someone tells you where to look.
Today, I visited one of several mariposarios (butterfly gardens), which was equally fabulous. My
favorites are the blue morphos--huge, clumsy things that flop around as if drugged by their own weight. On the outside, they´re a dull brown, with spots to trick predators into thinking they´re owl eyes--when the wings open, though, there´s often a shocking flash of bright blue. It was good fun spending an hour or so watching them.And then, onwards and upwards to the cascada (waterfall). Was a bit nervous when I discovered that the path to the waterfull started with a tarabita, or cable car: basically, you pay a guy a buck, stick yourself in a cage, and he pushes the cage over a rope across the river, because bridges are for sissies when you hike in Ecuador. Decided to go back the non-terebita way. The cascada, as it turns out, was yet another pay point/adventure destination: just for you, mom, I declined the opportunity to first zipline through the forest, then toboggan into the river. Settled for a nice, easy walk instead: it was quite pleasant.
Got back in time to pick up my laundry: now, all that´s left to do is enjoy a nice dinner (I now know that ¨tilapia¨is an entire, fried fish with eye sockets and tail, so I think it´s all downhill from lunchtime!) and get my last night of non-city sleep: tomorrow, off to Quito and then to Cartagena!
No comments:
Post a Comment